Page 39 of Rescued By the Mountain Man

She shot a look at me. “Oh, what do you do up there?”

“Sleep and fish,” I replied. “I take Goose up there with me because he loves to swim in the creek up there.”

Zara looked down at her lap. “Would you mind if I went with you?”

I dared look at her as we hit the highway. “You want to?” I winced at the incredulous tone in my voice.

Way to go, Warrick. Now she thinks you don’t want her to come.

She looked everywhere but at me. “If you don’t want me to?—”

“No, no, please, come with me. I’d like to show you the cabin,” I said as we turned off onto the road to the ranch. “What worries me is that it might look funny to the guys on the ranch. They’re already looking at me sideways, and I don’t want them to get on your case either.”

“They think we’re….” Zara paused. “What do they think we are?”

“Knocking boots,” I replied. “Yes, they do, and I am not the sort of man who does that kind of thing.”

“Oh,” she said quietly. “What if I don’t mind that…”

I stomped on the brakes so hard I damn well gave us whiplash, but that didn’t help as my head snapped to the left. Had I heard what I thought I’d heard? “Zara! W-what did you just say?”

Cars swirled around us, honks were deafening, and I heard someone shout at us, but I was deaf to what was outside the window and doors. All I needed to know was what Zara said and if I could dare hope.

She looked at me, nibbling on a corner of her lip and then—her lips met mine in a soft, swift kiss to my lips, sending a shock throughout my entire body. As short as the kiss was, it was unequivocally shattering.

I inched closer to her as her warm breath caressed my cheeks. The need to kiss her, to take her mouth with mine, overpowered me. I licked my lips but didn’t push any further.

Her kiss on my lips was soft—mine wasn’t.

Giving in to the hunger, I grabbed the back of her head, dipped mine, and claimed her mouth in a scorching kiss. Zara let out a noise that sounded like surprise, but then the noise turned low, husky, needy, and her hands skimmed up my chest to grip my shoulders.

I shouldn’t be doing this; I know I shouldn’t be. It was all kinds of wrong, and it was going to bite me in the ass. I was her boss, for God’s sake.

But damn it, if I wasn’t lost in the feel of her, her touch, her taste, and with each decadent slide of my lips against hers, my hunger spiraled into a craving. With a groan, my fingers tangled in her hair, holding her head in place while I continued to plunder her mouth.

It was like a dam had broken, releasing a flood of desire I’d been holding back from the day I’d laid eyes on her.

I wanted her in every way I could imagine.

Naked, sweaty, on the bed.

In the shower.

Bent over a table.

Against the wall—screaming my name at the top of her lungs.

A long horn blow jolted me out of my lust-filled haze, and regrettably, I turned the truck back in gear and headed up to the hills. Somehow, and for no logical reason, the tension seemed even higher between us, but it had another edge to it. It was not awkward, but anticipation.

We got to the ranch, and I kept my head straight ahead after I parked. “You regret it?”

Zara was silent for a long moment, so long I swore I heard crickets. Finally, she said, “When you wanted to get into bull riding, did anyone tell you it was a bad idea?”

A laugh punched itself out of my gut. “Sweetheart, they all did. Everyone I knew, and after word got around town, everyone I didn’t know, and their third aunt, who was twice removed, did.

"It was all doom and gloom; I’d fall to my death, a bull would stomp a mud hole through me, and a horn would go right through my gut. They all said it was a bad idea. I did it anyway.”

“That’s what I was counting on hearing because that is how I feel about this—us—now,” Zara replied.

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